Forget Me Not
by Rachel Ewok
Summary: Pippin and Merry are trying to adjust into life after the events of the War of the Ring. Estella Bolger wants Diamond of Long Cleeve want to forget the love they once shared with the cousins, but are Pippin and Merry ready to forget them? Canon.
1. Chapter 1: Scars

**Chapter 1**

"I suppose we should be settling down then, eh Pip?"

"I like it here in Crickhollow."

"But you know we can't stay together forever, Pippin."

"But I dinna want to live without you."

"Lasses don't like to share a household. They need something to look after you know. Makes them feel important."

"Then we should never get married."

Merry was silent and he took a long puff upon his pipe. They sat in the front garden at their house in Crickhollow. It had been a year since their return from the Journey, and the flowers Sam had planted in the gardens here when they first moved in were in full bloom.

Merry blew out a thoughtful smoke ring and surveyed Pippin's face carefully.

"Did you not fancy that lass from the Northfarthing? What was her name?"

Pippin choked on his pipe for a moment. "Diamond! Merry. Surely, not Diamond!" Pippin said this in dismay and Merry frowned.

"Diamond was her name, yes, and Pippin I seem to recall you more than fancied her." Merry raised an eyebrow, recalling the time he happened upon Pippin and Diamond near the Great Willow. He had stumbled into the grove by accident, but went wholly unnoticed by the pair. Diamond was pressed against the tree trunk, as Pippin stood, kissing her neck, her chin, his hand beginning to creep up her skirts…

Merry recalled Diamond's giggles and Pippin's sighs mixed in, and wondered what had happened to the couple, for they had seemed young and in-love in the summer sunshine of a few years past.

"Fancied her?" Pippin said this quietly. "Why… Why Merry that was before the Journey. Before… before I became too ugly for a lass."

"Pippin?" It was Merry's turn for questions; Merry had always considered Pippin to be quite attractive for a lad: and in Merry's eyes, the Journey had only helped to mature his child-like features in a most pleasant manner.

"Pippin… What?" Merry said again.

"The scars Merry!" Pippin cried in dismay. "The scars all over, I cannae let a lass see them, she would be horrified! She'd ne'er wish to look upon me again!" Merry was about to scold Pippin for his foolishness, and force him to go and speak with that poor lass Diamond before another hobbit snatched her away from him, but there were tears in Pippin's eyes and Merry didn't know what to say.

"Hoy, Pippin." Merry crooned softly, he scooted over on the bench and opened his arms: like a young lad Pippin threw himself into Merry's awaiting embrace and sobbed against his shoulder.

Merry forgot sometimes, that Pippin was still _Pippin_. Not of Age yet, still nearly a child by Shire reckoning. Everyone treated Pip differently now, now that he was a hero of the Shire and so much taller, but Merry knew that little Peregrin was still in there, and recognizing this fact, he held his young cousin, letting him cry.

Merry stroked Pippin's curls, he felt along his ear, and winced when he found the ribbon of an old scar. Merry had them too; he focused his attention but for a moment upon his own forehead and remembered the thin scar hidden there by his curls.

Merry wished then, to go back. For Pippin to be in love with Diamond, back when nothing else mattered but each other, and perhaps food on Pippin's part. Merry also wished for his own lass. His bonnie Estella, for she often tagged around with Pippin's lass Diamond. The two of them seemed near inseparable.

Merry hadn't spoken to her, not since he heard rumours that she was courting a certain Alberein Proudfoot. He hoped she was happy. Merry knew that things were different now, even in the Shire, after the Troubles, when the peaceful land had been occupied by wild men and orcs.

"Merry?" Merry had been so lost in his own thoughts he hadn't heard Pippin cease crying.

"Merry what are you thinking of?" Pippin asked quietly.

Everything. Merry thought. He was thinking of how things had changed, how Pippin and he had changed, he was thinking of Diamond, but mostly he was thinking of Estella.

"Nothing, lad. Don't worry a moment more about it." Merry patted Pippin's fair head.

"Now, you know, I think that we should have some lunch, and see about finding your Diamond, because I should like to know if she would feel the same way you do. I bet she is a right good upset with you for stoppin' your speaking with her Peregrin Took! You've probably broken the poor lass's heart!" Merry laughed and Pippin offered a small smile for Merry's efforts.

"Can we have cherry pie?" Pippin asked quietly.

Merry looked down at his cousin: he was so much like a young lad in his manner and speech right now; it nearly broke Merry's heart in two.

"Aye, Pip. Anythin' you want. You can have it." Pippin grinned up at Merry.

"Thanks." He said, his cheeky tone and rosy cheeks returning. "For there is but one slice left, and I dinna think there is enough for you and I to share." Merry shook his head in exasperation. Truly, he didn't like cherry pie, not as much as Pippin anyway, and he just wanted the younger hobbit to be happy.


	2. Chapter 2: A Decent Lad

Chapter 2

"Mum says I'm getting too old. I need to find a husband."

"I like it just the two of us."

"We're not little lasses any more Diamond."

"Says you."

"We can't live at home forever, don't you want a husband?"

"One that takes me far away and treats me as his personal breakfast-making, child-bearing-"

Estella Bolger rolled over to stare into Diamond's deep brown eyes. "Come now Diamond, you know 'tis not that bad, and if you could find a decent lad. You might come to love him in time."

Diamond sighed audibly. The two hobbit lasses lay out underneath a great oak tree in the middle of their favourite meadow. This meadow was hidden away down a secret forest path in Tookland. It had been one of their favourite haunts since they were but wee lasses. They used to come out here to pretend to be Ladies of far off lands awaiting their Princes, but now they were simply hobbits worrying over their husbands.

"I don't want to have to "come to love" anybody." Diamond said this quietly with a vengeance, and she looked away from Estella's eyes picking at a piece of grass, a frown upon her usually smiling lips.

"Al is nice." Stella finally said rolling back over on to her back, staring up at the sky. She was, of course, referring to Alberein Proudfoot, the gentlehobbit who she had been seeing, almost nearly courting for the past few months.

Diamond made a face, scrunching her nose up just so and letting out an annoyed huff of air.

"What! Diamond, do you want me to be alone forever?" Stella sighed; she knew what Diamond was thinking.

"Whatever happened to Meriadoc?" Diamond said after a moment's pause, she was staring up at the clouds, observing one that looked like a ring of pipe smoke. Stella winced, and there it was, Diamond _had_ been thinking of him.

"I liked him…. I liked _you_ and him." Diamond said, almost to herself, thinking of Estella and Merry. She remembered at the fair in Michel Delving when she and Stella had first met them: Merry and…. Diamond couldn't bring herself to think of him, the fair-haired, pleasant –faced, very Tookish cousin… Diamond shook her head and brought her mind back.

Estella looked lovely on Meriadoc's arm, if there were ever two hobbits that should be together; surely it was the two of them.

Estella wanted desperately to change the subject.

"And what of you!" She said, almost accusingly.

"I thought you fancied that Peregrin Took." Estella grinned triumphantly and Diamond stared angrily upon Stella's face. Pippin had not spoken to her, nor looked at her since his welcome home party and Diamond was certain he had found another lass.

"Don't talk to me of Peregrin Took." Diamond replied, a harsh tone in her voice.

"What! I remember you two spent a lot of time down by the Willow Tree." Stella said this teasingly with a wink, she knew that at least two summers ago Pippin and Diamond had begun a rather… passionate courtship, one that her parents most certainly would not have approved of.

Diamond stood up. "Doesn't matter now." She turned and began to walk away, before Stella could see the tears in her eyes.

Estella was shocked, "Di! Diamond, dear. What?" She couldn't fathom why it was that Diamond was suddenly angry, was Pippin courting another lass then? Did Diamond know something she wasn't telling her? Estella suddenly felt angry at the Thain's son, for he had most certainly made Diamond fall deeply in love with him, and she couldn't bear to see her Diamond hurting over the memory of that.

Why had he ceased speaking with her? Estella had no explanation. But she knew how Diamond must feel; Stella would secretly admit she felt stabs of pain when she thought of Meriadoc: how he had left and come back a stranger hobbit. But she would forget him and the romance they had shared nearly two summers back.

It was then Estella realised what she had to do: she had to help Diamond forget Pippin.

'Twas difficult, yes, to forget a first love, but together Stella was certain that they could forget nearly everything about the pair of Took and Brandybuck cousins.


End file.
